The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Cultural Acceptance of Video Games

There are pressures to tone down violence and other potentially offense content in video games. Many of these pressures stem from negative media attention and people like Jack Thompson who have made it their career to crusade against the free speech of game designers and developers. Those who fight for freedom of expression in this relatively young art form often speak of the day when video games will be seen as no different than television or movies, but is that really what the industry should be hoping for?

The gaming world was up in arms in 2007 when Rockstar Games' Manhunt 2 was edited to avoid the sales-ruining Adults Only rating from the ESRB. Self censorship is never a good thing, but, if the goal is to end up like TV and film, why should the video game industry care about a little thing like that? When master director Stanley Kubrick tried to release his film version of the Anthony Burgess novel A Clockwork Orange, he was forced to censor the film in order to avoid an “X” rating from the Motion Picture Association of America. When he tried to release the film in Britain, Kubrick was forced to withdraw the film from consideration, making it very difficult to watch the film in Britain for almost thirty years. Is this really the idyllic hope for the future of video games?

I may not be familiar with television censorship in the UK, but you can certainly find it alive and well in the States. The Federal Communications Commission has been authorized to levy a fine of up to $325,000 per offense for television stations that violate its standards of decency. This prohibitively large sum enforces yet more self censorship, this time in the world of television. What are video games supposed to learn from this form of media?

So then, what are video games going to model themselves after? The answer might be surprising: books. Anyone can go to a bookstore and purchase whatever sort of book they would like. Books require a similar time investment to that of a video game, and they are sold with a similar business model, but book publishers have never had a puritanical rating agency staring over their shoulder, forcing them to cut paragraphs and chapters out of their new release. Books may contain more sex and violence than games, and the effect may be greater due to the fact that books rely on the imagination much more than do video games.

In the end, video gaming is never going to be able to step out from under the thumb of oppressive, enforced limitations and de facto government censorship until it asserts itself as an art form. Freedom will not come in conforming to the system or in relenting to the media storm. Concerned parents need to realize that ratings are not a replacement for good parenting and that strict regulations are not only useless without proper parental involvement, restricting the free speech of game developers is a violation of fundamental artistic rights. The revolution may not be in film or television, it may not even be in books, but the lifting of oppression will happen. It's only a question of when.

--Tom

Picture Credit: www.amoeba.com